


Breathe

by KimBug



Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Circa season 2/3, OTA + Roy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-27
Updated: 2019-03-27
Packaged: 2019-12-25 10:07:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 11,615
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18259118
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KimBug/pseuds/KimBug
Summary: Felicity always knew she'd love Oliver until the day she died. She just didn't realize that day would happen so soon.Set circa season 2/3. An oldie but a goodie posted on ff.net back in the day.





	1. Chapter 1

She never thought it would end like this, starving for air in the dark.

Yes, she knew what they did was dangerous and they’d had close calls, but they’d always made it out and after a while it just seemed liked they always would.  Maybe their luck had run out.

She goes over her actions in her mind, what brought her here, she’s got time now, time to kill.  Ugh, she thinks shaking her head, why does her brain always come up with the worst way to say things?

It’s simple really, she let her guard down.  It was the price she paid, she supposed, for a year of happiness.  Because things had been good, so good, perfect, for long enough that she let her diligence slip, just enough it seemed, to get her here.  But she can’t bring herself to regret it, and despite her situation she smiles.  Even if it all ends now, it was worth it; her life with Oliver was worth it, she wouldn’t change a day.  So she makes a choice.  Instead of living her last moments in fear, she focuses on him.  She thinks about his smile, the one he saves just for her, that never ceases to make her heart flutter.  She thinks about the sound of his voice, deep and smooth, as he says her name, as he whispers ‘I love you’.  But most of all, she thinks about how wonderful it is to be loved by him, to have his whole amazing heart and soul.  The warmth that washes over her with these thoughts pushes away the panic that was clawing at her chest and as her mind starts to drift away, it’s almost peaceful.

Felicity always knew she’d love Oliver until the day she died.  She just didn’t realize that day would happen so soon.


	2. Chapter 2

16 hours earlier

Felicity Smoak hates alarm clocks.  She doesn’t hate mornings, mornings mean sunrises and coffee and a whole new day to conquer.  But alarm clocks, the shrill buzzing or beeping or obnoxious morning DJs pulling her kicking and screaming out of her peaceful and often too short slumber?  That she could do without.

It often takes a few minutes for her sleep fogged brain to register that the repetitive beeping she’s hearing is her alarm clock, and it takes another minute or so of her burying her head into the pillow before she admits to herself that she really shouldn’t just ignore it.  But her bed is so comfortable and warm that, some days, it seems to take an awful lot of will power to get out of it.  Today is one of those days, and she lets the harsh noise continue for longer than she should.

“Make it stop,” says a deep, rough voice from beside her and, for his sake more than hers, she finally reaches an arm over to the nightstand to turn off the offending sound.

“Sorry,” she says through a yawn before rolling over to face him.  “I’m having a hard time waking up today.  But, really, you’re partially to blame for that.”

He doesn’t open his eyes, but the corner of his mouth ticks up into smile.  “Why do you say that?” he asks.

“Because you insisted on having your way with me last night after we got home,” she teases him, smiling at the memory.

His smile broadens.  “I didn’t hear any complaints,” he says.

“Oh, I’m not complaining,” she says, reaching out to trace a finger over his bare chest.  Even after all this time, it still kind of amazes her that she gets to touch him like this.

His arm snakes around her waist and pulls her closer.  When he opens his eyes, they are so impossibly blue it makes her heart skip a beat.

“Good morning,” he says, and beneath her hand she can feel his chest rumble with the words.

“Morning,” she replies, snuggling closer.  It’s the opposite of what she should be doing, which is getting out of bed, but she finds she can’t help herself.  Oliver is too tempting.  So instead, she uses the tip of her nose to trace his collarbone while his fingertips draw abstract patterns on her bare back and she is so unbelievably content that she thinks she could spend the rest of her life just like this. 

Nine minutes later, when the mute of the snooze button has worn off and the beeping starts again, Felicity knows she can’t hide anymore.  With a sigh, she pulls herself away from him and braces for the chill she’ll encounter outside of the covers.  Oliver watches her with half lidded eyes.  “Stay with me,” he says.

“Oh I wish I could,” she says, swinging her legs onto the floor before she can procrastinate any longer.  “But Applied Sciences won’t run itself.”

He smirks a little at that and it makes her smile.

She feels his eyes on her as she moves across their room to the ensuite and before she shuts the door behind her, she beams at him one more time over her shoulder.  When she comes out again, showered and wrapped in her robe, he’s right where she left him.  She flits around the room, from her closet to the bathroom and back again, getting ready for her day.  She’d asked him, when they first started doing this, if it bothered him, her moving all around while he was trying to sleep.  He told her he found it comforting, hearing her movements while he drifted in and out of wakefulness.  So she goes about her business while he stays in bed.  It’s their weekday routine.

She slips on a navy dress, tops it with a while blazer.  She pulls her hair back into a ponytail and applies her makeup.  Before she leaves their room, she grabs a pair of heels and stops at the bed.

“Bye,” she says quietly, leaning over Oliver to kiss his cheek.  The stubble tickles her lips and she can see traces of her red lipstick left behind.

“Bye,” he replies huskily, rolling over to peck her lips.  He doesn’t say ‘I love you’ and neither does she, but she can see it in his eyes as clearly as if he’d said it out loud, and she knows her eyes are telling him the same.

Twenty minutes later, Felicity is walking through the lobby of Queen Consolidated.  It was weird at first, coming here without Digg and Oliver, but she’s used to it now.  It didn’t take Oliver long to admit that he was happier not being a CEO.  His family’s company was in good hands, making a profit, taking care of its employees, and helping the city.  Oliver had his club, and running that business kept him occupied.  It also gave him the added perks of being able to sleep in the mornings and letting him hang around Verdant all day.  Felicity knew he loved that place, both for the business he built on the top, and the mission he ran from the basement, and he was happy spending his time there.

“Good morning Jerry,” she says, passing by her assistant on the way to her desk.

“Good morning Miss Smoak,” he replies.  “Coffee is on your desk.”

“You’re the best,” she tells him, like she does every morning.  He really is a great assistant, and she feels she can say that with some authority having been an executive assistant herself.

At her desk, her morning passes in a blur. Magically, her coffee cup is never empty (did she mention he was a _great_ assistant?) and she doesn’t even realize it’s lunch time until her stomach starts to growl.  Her morning muffin, which also appeared magically on her desk, was hours ago, and her hunger forces her to pull her head out of the pile of tech reports she’d been buried in all morning.  She does need a break, she realizes, and she starts it by picking up her phone.

“Hey,” she hears when he answers, and she knows without having to see him that he’s grinning.  When Oliver is smiling, it carries into his voice.  She echoes his greeting.

“How’s your day going?” he asks.

She shrugs, even though some part of her brain knows he can’t see her.  “It’s fine.  I’m up to my eyebrows in reports but, at least as far as reports go, they’re fairly exciting.  Especially the one on the new microprocessor.  I can’t wait until we’re in business with that puppy.  What about you?  Are you working upstairs or downstairs?”

“Upstairs, actually,” he says, and she can hear the click of glass through the phone.  “Just had a liquor shipment come in.  Did you want to grab lunch?”

She frowns.  “I can’t today, I’ve got a meeting at 1.  And sadly, it’s not about the awesome microprocessor.”

“Ok then.  How about I have Big Belly Burger waiting for you when you’re done for the day?”

“Sounds delicious.  I’ll meet you at the club?”

“I’ll be here.”

They pause in a contented quiet for a moment, phone line still open, providing an intangible connection between them, before Felicity speaks again.

“Bye Oliver,” she says softly.

“Bye Felicity,” he answers, and then he’s gone.

The rest of Felicity’s work day goes by without incident.  Meetings, emails, water-cooler chit chat.  It surprises her, sometimes, that her days can be so completely normal while her nights are, decidedly, not.  It’s the same with her relationship with Oliver.  In some ways, they are a completely normal couple; movie nights in, the occasional dinner out, phone calls to touch base during the day, and spending time with friends.  Only most of their friends belong to a crime fighting team and, instead of taking couples cooking classes or ballroom dancing lessons, their hobby is vigilantism.  But Felicity loves those sorts of juxtapositions.  They make her life rounded, full, and she can’t remember ever being happier.

It’s 5:04pm when she shuts her computer down.  She’s alone in the office, Jerry’s work day ending at 4:30, and she gets into the elevator alone.  It stops a few times on the way down, picking up QC employees on their way home for the day, but Felicity is again alone in the elevator when she gets down to the parking garage.  She’s on her way to her car, digging through her purse for her keys, when she hears her name.  The voice is loud and echoes in the concrete of the underground parking and it startles her enough that she jumps as she spins around.

“Sorry,” says a uniformed police officer standing a dozen feet in front of her.  “I didn’t mean to startle you.  Are you Felicity Smoak?”

She eyes him for a second, but seeing his police uniform calms her down a little.  “Yes,” she answers.

“Captain Lance sent me,” he tells her.  “He needs to see you right away.  I have a car here, I can bring you.”

Felicity looks past him and spots the police car.  Her heart still hasn’t stop pounding completely, and she doesn’t move from her spot.  The officer takes some steps towards her.

“Why didn’t he call me?” she asks him.

“Because it’s urgent, Miss Smoak.  Urgent enough that he sent me to escort you personally.  So if you’d come with me...”

He’s walked close enough to her now to try to usher her in the direction of his car and, almost before she’s realizes it, she takes a few steps towards it.  Is it Oliver, she wonders.  Has something happened? But she comes back to herself, out of the haze of surprise and uncertainty, and stops walking.  The officer stops too, and looks at her with impatience.

“You know what,” she says, grabbing for her phone, “I’m going to call Captain Lance.  No offense,” she adds, slightly distracted as she thumbs through her contacts, “it’s just I’ve learned you can never be too careful, I mean –“

His sudden movement cuts her off and, before she can react, his fist hits the side of her face and everything goes dark.

***

As soon as Felicity starts to wake up, she realizes something is wrong.  This isn’t her house.  She can tell that without even opening her eyes.  It smells wrong, it’s too cold, and whatever she is lying on is hard, like concrete.  She tries to move and her head throbs and suddenly it comes back to her.  She was hit, punched, by that police officer in the parking garage.

The first thought that pops into her head is that she’s never been punched in the face before and, _damn_ , does it hurt.  She wonders, for a second, how Oliver, Roy and Diggle manage to take so many of these and still stay standing.  And then a second thought pushes itself into her mind – panic.

She has to stop herself from hyperventilating.  She can’t even manage to move her head and she feels so amazingly helpless it makes her want to cry.  But she hears movement, voices, from somewhere nearby and she forces herself to hold it in.

“Are you sure it’s her?” she hears a voice ask.

“I might be on the take but I’m still a cop,” another voice answers.  “That’s her.  Lance brought her in under suspicion of working with the Hood once in 2012 and, since then, her name has popped up more than once in Hood related cases.  She was even there the night he killed your predecessor.  If you’ve got her, he’ll come.”

Felicity cringes.  She’s bait, bait for the Arrow.

“So I’ve delivered the goods,” says the voice Felicity now recognizes as belonging to the police officer from the parking garage, “and now I want my money.  Enough money to get me away from here fast enough that no one notices.”

“Soon,” the other man answers.  “I’m going to need one more thing from you first.  Miss Smoak is going to take a little trip, and you’re going to bring her there.”

“That wasn’t part of the deal Vertigo,” the cop says angrily.

“As long as you’re working for me, you’ll do what I ask,” the other man retorts in a tone so harsh and cold that the cop offers no further argument.

The next thing Felicity knows, light is pouring in all around her.  The suddenness of it causes her eyes to squeeze shut before approaching footsteps make her pry them open again.  She just sees a shape at first, silhouetted in the light from the doorway.  It’s coming towards her and on instinct she’s reeling back, but a yank on her hair pulls her towards him instead.  He makes her sit up and the change in position has her head pounding and she whimpers without meaning to.  The man crouches down in front of her, putting them at eye level.  He doesn’t let go of her ponytail.

“Miss Smoak, I presume?”

This isn’t the man who grabbed her.  He’s older, bearded, and balding.  And he scares the crap out of her.

“What do you want from me?” she asks in a voice far steadier than she was expecting.

“You work with the Arrow, yes?” he asks her.

She doesn’t answer.  After a moment, his grip on her hair strengthens and he forcefully tugs her closer.  She whimpers again.

“I asked you a question,” he says.

She gathers all the strength she has and she yells at him, “What do you want from me?”

His gaze is steely and unrelenting but she thinks she might have impressed him a little with her outburst because he doesn’t strong-arm her again.  Instead he says, “Tell me how to contact the Arrow.”

She moves her eyes to the floor as she lies.  “I don’t know how.”

This time he doesn’t hold back and he pulls her hair with enough force that she’s flailing around like a rag doll before he pushes her back down onto the floor.

“You’re lying,” he snarls.  He moves to grab her again and Felicity knows she has to think fast.  She lets all the fear that she’s feeling come out in her voice and says “Captain Lance.”

The man, Vertigo the cop called him, and Felicity belatedly realizes this must be the new Count, pauses his approach. 

“Captain Lance knows how to contact the Arrow,” she tells him, her voice trembling and small.  It’s the best way she can think of to protect Oliver’s identity while still getting a message to him.  And as much as she wants to keep from luring Oliver into danger, she knows Vertigo isn’t going to let her lack of cooperation stop him.  So she gives him this piece of information and lets him think he scared it out of her.  Not that she isn’t scared; she is scared, and panicked, and aching, but it would take a lot more than that to make her betray Oliver.

“Good girl,” the Count tells her, giving her a smile that makes her skin crawl.  She’s still on the floor, propping herself up on trembling arms, when he moves to hover over her, a cell phone in his hand.  “Now say cheese,” he says, and the flash of light that follows lets her know he took her picture.

He turns his attention back to the cop.  “Put her in the car, take her here, then wait for my instructions. ” He hands over a piece of paper.  The cop studies it with an expression that says he’s not impressed, but he doesn’t argue.  He just gives a clipped nod.  Felicity watches the exchange, wondering what it means for her, where she could be going.  Vertigo starts to walk away from her and Felicity almost lets out the breath she’s been holding, when he suddenly turns to her again and heaves his boot into her side.  She screams in shock and pain.

“That’s for lying to me,” he tells her in a cold, impassive voice.  And then he’s gone.

Felicity stares at the cement, the tears she had been trying to keep at bay now streaming down her checks.  She watches the drops they leave on the floor as she tries to steady her breathing.  She has a feeling that if she starts sobbing now she might never stop, so she tries to keep them in, she doesn’t need to exhaust herself.  The cop is still standing near, but he’s giving her a minute.  Maybe he feels sorry for her, she thinks.  Maybe she can use that.

When he does finally come over to her, she looks up at him with sad eyes.  He grabs her arm to haul her to her feet and she whimpers, the pain in her side now mingling with the pain in her face.  He turns her around and cuffs her arms behind her back like she’s a perpetrator he’s bringing into the station, and marches her out to his police car.

“Where are you taking me?” she asks.  When he doesn’t reply, she asks again, more frantically, and starts to struggle against his lead.  He gives her a hard look.  “Don’t make me hit you again,” he tells her.

When he opens the trunk of the cruiser her eyes go wide.  “No,” she pleads with him.  “Don’t do this.”

He picks her up and she flails and screeches but it doesn’t stop him.  He lifts her into the trunk and slams the lid.  She sobs this time.  She can’t help it.

***

Her ride in the trunk of the police car is dark and bumpy.  It feels like they’ve been driving for a while, but it might just be an illusion of time, she can’t be sure.  She thinks of Oliver, of Digg and Roy.  She’s late for dinner, beyond late.  Do they know what’s happened to her?  She can picture Oliver pacing in the foundry, hands that he can’t keep still combing through his hair.  Her heart aches for him.  And they are the best, team Arrow, she knows that.  But part of her still can’t help but wonder if, this time, someone will get the better of them, and her team will be hurt, or worse, all in an attempt to save her.  That thought makes her heart break in half.

When she feels the car stop and the engine turn off, she tries to shake off those thoughts.  She wants to be ready in case she gets a chance to run, or to fight.  So knows she’s not the best at either of those things, but she has to try.  The trunk opens and she tries to sit up, sore muscles protesting.  The cop grabs her and lifts her out.  Then, instead of putting her down, he hauls her over his shoulder and starts walking.

“No!” Felicity protests, writhing as best she can.   “Put me down!”

The cop only grunts.  “It’s easier this way,” he says.

Felicity lifts her head, trying to get her bearings, but all she sees are trees, everywhere.  They’re out of the city then, with no one to hear her cries for help.  She kicks her legs, rolls her body, but the cop just holds her tighter and keeps walking.  “Take it easy, lady,” he mutters under his breath, and Felicity is incredulous. 

“Really?!” she barks at him.  “You’re kidnapping me and you want me to ‘take it easy’?”

“Look, it’s nothing personal,” he tells her, like that revelation is supposed to make her feel any better.

“He’ll kill you,” she tells him, voice softer than before, “the Arrow.  If anything happens to me, he’ll kill you.”  It’s not a threat she’s making, it’s a statement, and the thought of it makes her sad.  Not because this man kidnapping her will die, but because she doesn’t want Oliver to have to live with the burden of taking another life.

“The Count will kill me if I don’t,” he answers blankly, stopping his trek and reaching out with one of his hands.  Felicity hears the chirp of metal as the cop swings open a door.  Then he hauls her off his shoulder and sits her down on cold steal.  He looks at her for a second, and Felicity sees something in his expression: remorse.

“I’m sorry,” he tells her, and her panic amps up a hundred fold.  In one determined movement, he shuts the door, sealing her inside a metal box.

“NO!” she yells, she pleads.  “Please don’t do this!”  But while her cries echo around her own head in the small space, from outside, there’s only silence.

It doesn’t take her long to realize the box is airtight.  There isn’t a spot of light anywhere and the air around starts to grow warm and stale too quickly.  She tries to control her breathing, tries not to gasp for air as hot tears stream down her face.  How much air does she have? she wonders.  Then her brain kicks in and reminds her that it’s not lack of oxygen that makes people suffocate in enclosed spaces but the build up of carbon dioxide.  You’re essentially poisoned by your own respiration.  She sarcastically thanks her brain for that piece of information and tries doubly hard to control her breathing. 

She can’t be sure how long she’s there, the darkness and silence give her nothing to judge by. The box is empty, save for her, the metal bare and smooth.  It’s no bigger than a closet and she gives up exploring it when she realizes there is nothing to find.  To give herself some focus on she tries marking time, counting seconds, ticking off steady intervals of one through sixty, but her brain wanders.  Mostly, her thoughts come back to her friends, her team, to Oliver.  They’re coming, she tells herself.  They’re trying to find her.

She notices that she starts to get sleepier, and that her head is throbbing again.  Her breathing has picked up too, she realizes, despite her best efforts to calm it down.  And while her thoughts are getting more jumbled and fuzzier around the edges, she has enough brain power left to know that these are not good signs.  For the first time since this whole thing started, she allows a forbidden notion to enter her mind: she might not make it out of this one. 

She thinks back on her day, her week, her life, on everything that brought her here, to this moment and, in an incredible flash of clarity, she realizes that she doesn’t regret it any of it.  Ok, maybe she regrets letting that kidnapping cop get too close to her.  But beyond that, she knows that even if it all ends now, it was worth it, her life with Oliver was worth it.  So she makes a choice, a choice to push away the fear and focuses on him.  She thinks about his smile, the one he saves just for her, that never ceases to make her heart flutter.  She thinks about the sound of his voice, deep and smooth, as he says her name, as he whispers ‘I love you’.  But most of all, she thinks about how wonderful it is to be loved by him, to have his whole amazing heart and soul.  The warmth that washes over her with these thoughts overtakes the panic clawing at her chest and, as unconsciousness beings to creep across her, it’s almost peaceful.

Felicity always knew she’d love Oliver until the day she died.  She just didn’t realize that day would happen so soon.


	3. Chapter 3

Oliver Queen was having a good day.  There was nothing overtly special about it, but if there was one thing Oliver had gotten good at in the past couple of years, it was appreciating the little things.  He’d woken up this morning in a bed that smelled like Felicity, and he’d kissed her goodbye before she headed for work.  He drank some really great coffee from the cafe on the corner, and then the club’s liquor delivery came in exactly right, just what he’d ordered.  Little things like this, he had come to realize, were what normal life was all about.  And he’s never been happier.

There was a time when Oliver was certain that he couldn’t have this, a life in the light while having another in the shadows, but Felicity had shown him that he could, that _they_ could.  And he’s so grateful that she did.  Because he loves his normal life, with his beautiful girlfriend, his job, and his friends, but he’s also come to enjoy the part where it becomes decidedly not normal, when he slips away into his nightclub’s basement and spends his time crafting arrows and hitting training dummies.  What used to feel like a curse, a weight, an obligation, now fills him with pride.  It’s not always easy, but they’re making a difference down here, and it gives him a satisfaction he’s never felt before.

He’s sparring with Diggle this afternoon, and they are working each other hard.  They’re both shirtless and sweating buckets, but they’re having a good time.  Oliver usually has the upper hand, but John can hold his own and really challenge him in a way that few others can, and Diggle almost takes him down this round before Oliver turns the tables and pins him to the mat.  Diggle is chuckling when Oliver lets him go.

“I almost had you,” Digg tells him.  “You must be getting tired.”

Oliver only grins as he towels the sweat off his face and picks up his water bottle.

“Is Felicity joining us today?”  Digg asks.

“She’s coming after work,” Oliver says, pulling a tshirt over his head.  “I promised her Big Belly for dinner, which,” he says glancing at the clock, “I should probably run out and get before she gets here.”

Diggle nods.  “I’ll hold down the fort until you get back,” he says as Oliver slips on his jacket and pats his pockets for some car keys.  When he finds them, he heads for the stairs.

“And pick me up a side of onions rings,” Diggle calls after him.  “After today’s workout, I think I’ve earned them.”

Oliver puffs out a laugh as he climbs the steps and makes a mental note to add onion rings to Digg’s order. 

The drive to Big Belly Burger is slow but uneventful.  Oliver listens to talk radio as he crawls his way through rush hour traffic.  He waits longer than normal at Big Belly as well, having come into the diner at the tail end of an after-work rush, but he doesn’t mind.  It seems like the last eight years of his life have been a lesson in patience, so waiting a few extra minutes for a fast food order doesn’t really phase him. 

By the time he’s back at Verdant, it’s nearing 5:30.  He shifts the take-out bags and drink tray around in his arms so he can punch in the code for the side door, then starts making his way down the stairs.  He expected that Felicity would have beat him here, that he’d hear her voice, chatting with Diggle, as he made is way down the steps, but it’s quiet.  There’s only John, sitting in Felicity’s chair, scrolling through news reports on one of the computer screens.

“Felicity isn’t here yet?”  Oliver asks as he sets their food down on a mostly clear metal table.

“Nope,” Diggle says, turning to face him.  “I haven’t heard from her.”

“Huh,” says Oliver, rooting through a take-out bag and handing a grease spotted container of onion rings to Diggle.  “Maybe she got held up.  Traffic is moving pretty slow out there.”

Diggle starts in on his onion rings and Oliver picks at his fries.  They chit chat as they eat or, more precisely, while Diggle eats and Oliver tries to wait patiently for Felicity.  He’s purposefully not watching the clock because, as they say, a watched pot never boils.  But when he starts noticing that his french fries have gone cold, Oliver gives himself a second to worry.

“Maybe she had to work late,” Diggle offers.

“Maybe,” Oliver says, fishing his cell phone from his pocket.  He calls her, but it goes to voicemail.  He leaves a quick message, saying dinner is waiting for her, and ends the call, but he doesn’t put the phone away.  After ten minutes he sends her a text.  Five minutes after that, he sends another.  When his phone continues to remain silent, he starts to pace.

“Try not to jump to conclusions Oliver,” Diggle tells him as he holds his phone to his ear and hears another call to her go to voicemail. 

“It’s not like her to be late,” Oliver says, the tension apparent in his voice.  And he knows that however much Diggle is trying to calm him down, that part of him has to be worried too. This isn’t like Felicity, to be this late and not get word to them, to not answer her phone.

“I can take a run to QC,” Diggle offers.  “See if she’s still there.”

Oliver stops pacing long enough to give Diggle a nod and watch his friend rise and reach for his jacket.

“I’ll get Roy to meet you here,” Diggle says on his way out.

“I don’t need a babysitter Digg,” Oliver snaps.

“With something like this,” Diggle replies, “yes you do.”

Oliver shoots a glare at his friend but doesn’t say anything further.  He knows where Diggle is coming from.

Oliver alternates between watching the clock, watching the door, and willing his phone to ring.  He starts mindlessly bouncing and catching a tennis ball just to have somewhere to put his nervous energy.  When he hears the foundry door open his heart jumps, but it’s only Roy, come to make sure he doesn’t do anything destructive or foolish as the panic builds in his stomach.

Finally, a phone rings, but it’s not the one that Oliver has been clutching in his hand.  The sound is muffled and Roy realizes before Oliver that it’s the Arrow’s phone that’s ringing, still tucked into the drawer of Felicity’s desk.  Roy pulls it out and tosses it at Oliver.

“Captain,” Oliver says when he answers it, the automatic voice modulator colouring his greeting to Captain Lance.

“We need to meet,” the Captain says sternly.  “Now.  Felicity Smoak is being held hostage.”

The moment he hears the words, Oliver stops breathing.  The panic that has been clawing at his gut since he noticed she was late finally explodes which such force that, for a second, he is literally paralyzed with fear.  But then some part of his brain, the part that was conditioned by Lian Yu, by Amanda Waller, by five years of hell, by fighting as the Arrow, that part kicks in and pushes the fear aside and makes him move again.

“On my way,” Oliver answers, already moving towards his Arrow gear.  He doesn’t even remember that Roy is with him until he hears his somewhat panicked voice ask “What is it? What happened?”

“Felicity’s been taken,” Oliver says, his voice as even as he can make it.  “Lance has information. I’m going to meet with him.”

"I’m coming with you,” Roy tells him, already moving towards his gear.

“No,” Oliver barks.  “Stay here, get on the comms. Talk to Diggle.  I’ll get the information from Lance.”

Roy frowns, but nods.

“Be ready, though,” Oliver adds, “in case I need to send you out somewhere.”

Roy nods again and moves to sit at Felicity’s desk.  Oliver gears up in a haze, his movements automatic and detached.  When he gets his bike onto the street, he drives so fast it’s dangerous, even for him.  He hears Roy report through the comms that Diggle found Felicity’s car at Queen Consolidated, but that he couldn’t find her, and he processes that information as unemotionally as he can.  As his bike rolls into the alley behind the police station, he sees that Lance is already waiting for him.

“I got this text about 20 minutes ago,” the Captain says without preamble, holding out a phone for Oliver to grab.  When Oliver takes it, his heart stops.

There a picture of Felicity, her face bruised and tear stained, lying on a concrete floor.  Her blazer, that Oliver remembers being crisp and white this morning, is stained and dirty.  Underneath the picture is a single line of text: For the Arrow.  15th and Dale.

Oliver’s rage is palpable.  “Who’s got her?” he nearly yells.

“I don’t know,” is Lance’s reply.  “We can’t trace the number.”

Oliver tosses the phone back at the Captain before he turns and starts back down the alley towards his bike.

“Hey!” Lance calls after him and Oliver, reluctantly, turns back around.

“Let me know what you find,” Lance tells him, his voice carrying a touch of sadness that Oliver knows comes from the fact that Lance cares about Felicity too.  “I, uh,” he huffs a breath, “I’ll have to tell her boyfriend.”

Something inside Oliver shatters.  The feelings he’s been trying to tuck away, the panic, the paralyzing fear, they come back and for a second he’s rooted to the ground.  And then the Arrow takes over again, and with one wordless nod, he’s on his bike and he’s racing through the city.

“Roy!” Oliver barks into the comms.  “Meet me at 15th and Dale.”

Oliver navigates the streets without thinking, without stopping, without slowing down.  When he gets to the corner of 15th Street and Dale Avenue, he finds a vacant lot and an abandoned warehouse.  He parks his bike in the lot.  The space is wide open and flat, he’s got no vantage point and no cover and he finds he doesn’t care.  Before he can move on the warehouse, he hears the approach of Roy’s bike.  The engine is revving high and a tire squeals as it rounds the corner and he knows that Roy is moving as fast as he was. 

They don’t speak as they stand outside the warehouse.  Oliver simply signals for Roy to move around the outside, to find another way in, while he takes the front door.  Roy nods, arms himself with his bow, and moves.  Oliver readies his own bow then uses his pent up rage to kick in the front door.

The inside of the warehouse is quiet and still.  Oliver moves cautiously through the space, alert for any sound, any movement, ready to let loose his arrows.  A noise to his right makes him spin around, but it’s only Roy who’s moving through the warehouse with the same watchfulness as Oliver.  When they meet in the middle, they lower their bows slightly.  The place seems empty.

“Search it,” Oliver barks to Roy, his irritation coming out in his voice.   He had hoped he could end it here, now, this whole nightmare, but it didn’t look like that was going to be the case. 

Suddenly, a shrill ringing breaks through the silence.  Oliver and Roy immediately point their bows in the same direction, towards a stack of wooden pallets near the back of the open space.  They move towards it, Oliver taking the lead.  The sound continues and as he moves towards the stack, Oliver can see a cell phone, sleek and black, sitting on top of the wood.  He grabs it as soon as he’s in reach.  With a jut of his chin, he tells Roy to move, to start searching the space, before he answers the call he’s sure is for him.

“Where is she?” Oliver growls, the roughness in his voice coming from a place of pure anger.

“Mr. Arrow, I presume?” a man answers him flippantly.  The response makes Oliver’s fist clench.

“Where is she?” he repeats.

“Somewhere far away from you, and from me,” says the voice, not giving him any real answers. 

The response kicks Oliver’s already boiling rage into overdrive and he yells into the phone “What do you want?”

“It’s simple really,” the man answers, seemingly unaffected by Oliver’s outburst.  “I want you to surrender to me.  Once the Arrow is dead, Miss Smoak will be released.”

Oliver’s jaw clenches even tighter.  “How about you give me Miss Smoak or I storm in and take her?” he counters.

The voice huffs a laugh.  “You could bring a whole SWAT team and it wouldn’t make a difference.  She’s not with me.  But I am the only one who knows where she is.  And I can tell you that where she is has an occupancy limit.”

“What do you mean?” Oliver spits out through tight teeth.

“Her air is running out.  Every second we spend talking, that you spend looking for her, Miss Smoak is using up her finite supply of oxygen.  By my calculations, she’s got until eleven o’clock tonight before it’s all over.  So if I were you, I wouldn’t dawdle.  If you’re not back here alone and unarmed by 11pm tonight, she’ll be dead.  And does that poor girl really deserve to die just because she’s been helping you?”

Before Oliver knew what was happening, his fist was hitting the wall.  The already crumbling drywall gave way easily under the force.  The call had been disconnected and it took all of Oliver’s self control not to smash the phone to bits.  Tech was traceable Felicity would always tell him, so he kept it whole even though the person most qualified to do the tracing was the one they were looking for.  When Roy came up to him, he didn’t ask about the call, he didn’t mention the hole in the wall, he just held up an earring.  It was a feather made of gold, and they both knew that it belonged to Felicity.

Oliver did the drive back to the foundry on autopilot.  Telling Digg and Roy what had happened passed in a haze.  He didn’t know how he was still functioning since he was pretty sure he had stopped breathing and his heart had stopped beating from the moment Lance had shown him that picture.  This was his fault.  It was everything he had feared.  Felicity was in danger because of him, because he was the Arrow.    

Somewhere near him, Roy and Diggle are talking.  He can hear the sounds, but the words aren’t registering in his brain.  All he can think about is Felicity bruised and crying and gasping for breath.  And he doesn’t know where she is.  He flips the table.  Tools and arrows once all precisely arranged, clang and clatter to the floor.

“Oliver!” Diggle’s voice snaps him back to the present and Oliver looks around him to see Digg and Roy looking at him with concerned faces.

“You need to keep it together man,” Diggle tells him, but he must see something in his face, some of the desperation that Oliver can’t mask right then, because his next words are softer.  “I know this hard for you.  I’m scared for her too.  But we need to pull it together if we’re going to find her.  And we are.  We are going to find her.  Alright?”

Oliver closes his eyes and breathes.  He counts through his inhales and exhales, slowing his pounding heart, clearing his mind, using the meditation he learned so many years ago.  When he opens them again, he nods to Diggle.

“Good,” his friend says before getting back to business.  “We need to update Lance.  Get his people to look through the Queen Consolidated security footage too.  It’ll go faster if we’re both combing it.”

Oliver nods and thanks his lucky stars for Diggle’s foresight to get a copy of the security footage when he first found Felicity’s car.

“Are you up to contacting Lance?” Diggle asks him.  “Because Roy can do it.  With the voice modulator on the phone, Lance will never know the difference.”

“I can do it,” Oliver answers, grabbing the Arrow’s phone and moving a few steps away.

His conversation with Captain Lance is as concise as he can make it.  When he tells him that Felicity will be left to suffocate if they don’t find her, he hears Lance mutter “Son of a bitch” which is then followed by a louder, almost accusatory question.  “How did this guy know Miss Smoak was working with you?”

Oliver stiffens as a fresh wave of guilt runs through him.  “I don’t know,” he answers honestly.

"I’ll let you know if we find anything,” Lance says before ending the call.

Oliver tosses the phone down with more force than he should before turning to make his way back to Roy and Diggle.  Before he can get there, the phone rings again, but it’s not the one he just put down.  The ringing is coming from Oliver’s jacket.

When Oliver digs out his cell phone, the caller ID is flashing “SCPD” and he knows that it’s Captain Lance calling to tell him all the horrible news he already knows.  He tries to keep his voice neutral as he answers.

“Hello,” he says.

“Oliver?” It’s Captain Lance, and he’s using Oliver’s first name which, even if Oliver didn’t already know how grave the news was, would be a dead giveaway. 

“I’ve got some bad news,” the cop continues, “it’s about Felicity.”

The tactical part of Oliver’s brain is telling him that he’s going to have to sell it, so he lets the wall that he’s had to construct around his feelings crack, and out spills the fear and the panic that Oliver has been trying so hard to keep in check.  It’s a bit of relief, actually, to be allowed to feel it, to say it.

“I will do everything in my power to get Felicity home safe,” Lance tells him, and Oliver knows without a shadow of a doubt that he means it.

“Thank you,” he answers, his voice think with emotion.

“Hang in there kid,” Lance says before he hangs up. 

The sincerity in Captain Lance’s tone is almost too much for Oliver to take and he needs a moment to pull himself back together before joining Roy and Diggle.  Would that sincerity be there, Oliver wonders, if Lance knew that he was the Arrow, that he was the one who put Felicity in danger?

“Anything?” Oliver asks.

“I tried to trace Felicity’s phone,” Diggle tells him, the computer program Felicity designed to help them track cell phone signals up and running on the screen, “but I’m not getting anything.  My guess would be that they trashed it.”

“I’ve got Felicity leaving her office at 5:04,” Roy says, pointing to the black and white video from Queen Consolidated’s security cameras, “and then entering the parking garage at 5:07,” he points to another image, “and then nothing.  I can’t find her on any other cameras.  But we know she didn’t make it to her car.”

“Then how did they get her out?”

“I don’t know.”

“Let’s look at every piece of video from that parking garage.  They took her out somehow.”

Oliver then does what every fiber of his being is screaming at him not to do: he sits down.  His body, full of nervous energy and anger, wanted to move.  It wanted to run through the streets of Starling, breaking down doors and screaming Felicity’s name until he found her.  But he forces himself down in front of the computer and starts examining footage of Queen Consolidated’s parking garage.  Their best chance of finding her, he knows, is getting a clue about where to look.

They work in silence, all of them.  What is there to say?  They love her too, Oliver knows, in a different way than he does but it’s love just the same.  Will they blame him too, he wonders, if she doesn’t make it out of this? 

He watches the clock as much as he dares.  He was given a deadline but he knows if he thinks about it too much, he won’t be able to think about anything else.  How long can they spend on this, though, before they have to find another way? 

Something in the black and white images catches his eye.  It’s not an answer, but maybe it’s a way to help get some. 

“There’s a police car,” Oliver says out loud. He pauses the video just as the cruiser is making its way through the open security gate.  “The timing is right,” he adds, noticing the time stamp at the bottom.  “Maybe they saw something.”

He’s on his feet in an instant, the Arrow’s phone to his ear.  He knows it’s not much, but he has to jump on every possibility to get answers.  When Lance answers with a curt “Yeah”, Oliver jumps right in.

“The security cameras at Queen Consolidated show an SCPD cruiser leaving the underground parking just after 5pm.  I need to know if the officers in that car saw anything.”

“We didn’t have any calls into QC today,” the Captain answers him.  “I’ve already checked.”

Something clenches in Oliver’s gut.  “Check again,” he bites out.  It’s not a suggestion.

“Yeah,” Lance says, “I’ll get back to you.”

Oliver doesn’t sit back down.  He can’t.  Instead he paces and grabs at his hair, his neck.  Roy and Diggle are as tense as he is and Oliver realizes that waiting for answers is even worse than trying to find them.  Finally, after what feels like an eternity, Lance calls him back.  Oliver puts the call on speaker.

“I was right,” Lance says as soon as Oliver picks up.  “We didn’t have any calls into QC today.”

“So what was it doing there?”

“I don’t know.  I checked the cruiser number and it’s signed out to an Officer Michael Burke.  He’s scheduled for graveyard shift tonight and he’s not answering my calls.”

“Captain,” Oliver starts, but Lance cuts him off.

“I know.  I’m getting our techs to call up the GPS on the cruiser now.  We track the whole fleet.  I’ll know everywhere he’s been today.”

After a pause, he hears Lance mutter “Ah shit.”  Then louder, “After going to Queen Consolidated, the cruiser spent just about an hour at 15th and Dale.”

Oliver just about leaps out of his skin.  This is it, the break they’ve been waiting for.

“Where is he now?”

“About 40 miles outside of Starling.”

Oliver’s gaze shoots over to the clock.  40 miles was a long way to go, and they were running out of time. 

“Send me the coordinates,” Oliver snaps.

“Fine,” answers Lance, “but we’re going out there too.”

“Fine,” Oliver answers, then disconnects the call.  A few seconds later, a text appears on his screen with a set of coordinates.  Diggle has already pulled up a picture of Officer Burke and Roy is grabbing his gear.

“Get there as fast as you can,” Oliver tells them.  Diggle shoots him a look. 

“You’re not going?” he asks.

“No,” Oliver answers, his voice calmer than it’s been in hours.  “If you can’t find him in time, if you can’t find Felicity, I need to be at 15th and Dale.”

“To surrender?” Diggle asks with disbelief.  “You know that’s the last thing she would want you to do.”

“I won’t let her die,” he says simply.

“It won’t come to that,” Roy says strongly.  “We’ll find her.”

“Go,” Oliver tells them calmly.  “I’ll be on the comms.”

For the first time since he found out Felicity was taken, Oliver is alone in the foundry.  And for the first time since he found out Felicity was taken, he sits in her chair.  He takes one moment, just one, to feel all the emotions that this simple action brings up, before pushing them aside and opening their own tracking software.  In an instant, Oliver can see Roy’s bike speeding towards the Starling City limits as Digg follows in their black van.  He wants desperately to be the one on the move, to be the one tracking her down, bringing her home, but he can’t.  Because at some point, he doesn’t even really know when, Oliver made the decision that he would trade his life for Felicity’s.  If that was what it took to make sure she was safe, he would do it.  So he waits, and it just might be the hardest thing he has ever had to do.

Digg and Roy give him updates, but there really isn’t anything to say.  He can see their positions and, as the deadline approaches, he can see they’re getting close, but they’re not close enough.  With a surprising sense of calm, Oliver gets up and reaches for his bow. 

“I’m headed to 15th and Dale,” he says into the comms.

“Oliver,” he hears Digg start to say, but he cuts him off.

“I’ll stall as long as I can.  Keep me posted.”

Moving feels infinitely better than sitting still and maybe it’s because now Oliver knows that, one way or another, he is going to end this.  The warehouse looks the same as it did just hours earlier, dark and empty, but Oliver knows whoever took Felicity must have eyes on it, so he still approaches it cautiously, arrow nocked.  When he gets inside, he immediately knows something is different.  There’s a dim light that wasn’t there the first time and in the almost deafening silence of the place, he can hear the rustling movement of a human body.  He moves towards it and can soon make out a silhouette in the glow of a lamp.

“I thought I said come unarmed,” a voice tells him, the voice from the phone.

“That wasn’t going to happen,” Oliver replies, voice gruff.

The man chuckles.  “I suppose not.”  And in the darkness, Oliver can hear the tell tale click of a gun cocking.

With slow, calculated movements, Oliver gets closer to the man in the shadows who, as if to show Oliver that he’s not intimated, takes a step forward himself, into the light.

“Vertigo,” Oliver says with recognition.

“You remember me,” the Count says with a sneer.  “It’s just the two of us, I assure you.  So perhaps we could lower our weapons and talk like gentlemen?”

Oliver’s eyes narrow.  Part of him is itching to shoot a thousand arrows into this dirt bag, but he reminds himself that what’s happening right now is either about stalling for time or surrendering himself for Felicity’s life.  So he lowers his bow.  After a beat, the Count lowers his weapon a well.

“Where’s Miss Smoak?” Oliver demands.

The Count just shakes his head.  “That’s not how this works,” he says.  “I’m offering you a trade: your life for hers.”

“How about I just kill you instead.”

Vertigo counters with another mirthless smile.  “I’m the only one who knows where she is.  Kill me, and she’ll suffocate before anyone finds her.  In fact, if you drag this out any longer, she might suffocate anyway.  I’ve never made an air-tight box before, my calculations might be off.”

Oliver has his comm link open.  Diggle and Roy should be able to hear what’s going on, and they’re not telling him to stop.  Oliver doesn’t take that as a good sign.

“How do I know you won’t just let her die anyway?”  Oliver asks.

“Because I’m a man of my word.  And my problem isn’t with Miss Smoak, it’s with you.”

Oliver doesn’t budge.  He may be willing to give up his life for Felicity’s, but he isn’t stupid.

“How about this,” Vertigo counters.  “If you surrender to me, I’ll let you live long enough to hear me call Captain Lance with her location.”

Time is almost up, Oliver knew that when he came here.  Diggle and Roy aren’t getting back to him.  They haven’t found her yet.  Oliver offers the only deal he can live with.

“I want to hear her voice.”

“What?”

“If I surrender, I want to hear her voice, I want her to tell me she’s safe and with Captain Lance.  Then you can kill me.” And he means it, with every fiber of his being he means it.

Vertigo is quiet, his face almost pensive.  Oliver is ready to drop his bow, ready to give it all up, when he hears Roy’s breathless voice in his ear.  “We’ve got her.”

Oliver unleashes arrows so fast he doesn’t even register that he’s doing it.  And it’s only force of habit, not conscious thought, that puts those arrows into arms and knees instead of into Vertigo’s chest.

The Count screams in pain and from the further recesses of the warehouse, two more armed men emerge.  Oliver sends them to the floor as well.  Over the pounding of blood in his ears, he can hear snippets of Roy and Diggle talking, saying words like “hospital” and “ambulance” and he can hear the wailing of what sounds like an entire fleet of sirens.  He hopes that Lance left at least a few police officers in Starling City, at least enough to come and clean up this warehouse.  Because Oliver worries that if he has to wait here too long, he just might kill The Count.  And he wouldn’t regret it.


	4. Chapter 4

Starling Memorial is quiet this time of night.  Or at least it’s quiet where he is.  Oliver is grateful for that.  When he first got there it was chaos, a cacophony of sirens and police boots and EMTs.  Not only was Felicity being brought in, but the men Oliver wounded were as well.  And the cop that took her, Michael Burke, he was there too.  Oliver caught a glimpse of him before police ushered him away and he took some satisfaction in seeing the man’s bruised jaw and potentially broken nose.  He couldn’t help but wonder which very angry friend of Felicity’s was responsible for that.

The wait to see Felicity seems unbearably long.  He knew from Digg and Roy that she was unconscious when they found her, but she was still alive.  He knew from Lance that, even though it was a long trip back to Starling, EMTs were helping her on route and he assured Oliver that she was in very capable hands.  And even though Oliver was already at Starling Memorial Hospital when they brought her in, he wasn’t allowed to see her until she was out of the trauma bay and moved into a patient room.  So he is back to waiting, even though he feels like he’s done quite enough of that today already.

Diggle and Roy had headed back to the foundry, but Oliver knows they’d be here soon, showered and changed and looking for all the world like they didn’t just race for 40 miles into the woods to save their friend.  So for now he waits alone, in a quiet seating room on the fourth floor of the hospital, with so many thoughts racing through his head that they threaten to consume him.

The ding of the elevator catches his attention and Oliver is both surprised and not surprised to see Captain Lance coming towards him. 

“Thought I’d find you here,” Lance says, dropping into a chair in a way that relayed just how tired he was.

Oliver answers with, “They haven’t let me see her yet.”

The Captain gives him a sad smile.  “I know, kid.  She’ll be settled up here soon.  The doctors are just checking her out.”

The two men sit in silence for a little while, both lost in their own thoughts.  It’s Oliver who speaks again.

“Thank you,” he says, his gaze steady on the police Captain, “for finding her.  For bringing her back.”

Lance nods at him.  “I’m glad I could,” he says.  “Felicity is...special.”  Then his lips quirk up a little and he adds, “But I’m sure I don’t need to tell _you_ that.”

Oliver tries to smile back at him, but he can’t really manage it. 

Lance gives him a long look then asks, “This work she does, helping the Arrow.  How do you feel about it?”

Oliver answers around a lump in his throat.  “Sometimes, I wish she would stop,” he says honestly.

“Me too,” the Captain says.  Then he takes a breath, as if steeling himself for what he has to say next.  “Burke, the guy that took her?  He’d been looking through all the case files involving the Arrow.  Felicity’s name comes up in more than a few of them.  I guess it was enough for him to make the connection.  And that...” Lance trails off for a second before continuing, “that’s my fault.  Partly, anyway.  And I just want you to know that I’ll be censoring her name in those files, and in any future files involving the Arrow that might come up.  I know that, right now, it’s coming a little late.  But hopefully it’ll prevent something like this from happening again.”

Not trusting himself to speak, Oliver only nods.

Lance stands up, his weariness apparent in his movements.  “You gonna be ok here?” he asks Oliver.

“Yeah.”

To Oliver’s surprise, Lance reaches over and squeezes his shoulder before walking back to the elevator.  Oliver knows the gesture was meant to comfort him, but it only serves to ratchet up his guilt.  He was the reason she was taken, the reason she almost died.  He doesn’t deserve comfort.

When Diggle and Roy arrive, Oliver is still waiting.  Digg takes a seat next to him, but Roy can’t seem to stop moving.  Oliver guesses that his adrenaline is still pumping.

“Which one of you punched him?”  Oliver asks after a few minutes.

“I did,” Roy says without remorse.  “And the asshole deserved a lot more than that.”

Roy’s response gets a real smile out of Oliver, but it fades quickly.  Oliver can feel Diggle’s gaze on him, sizing him up.  When his friend suggests that Roy head down to the cafeteria and see if he can rustle them up some coffee, Oliver knows they’ll be having a talk.  He’s not looking forward to it.

“She’ll be ok Oliver,” Digg says to him.

“Yeah,” Oliver answers, but it’s half hearted.

Then Diggle heaves a big sigh and pushes right to the crux of the matter.  “This wasn’t your fault,” Digg tells him.

“She was targeted because of me,” Oliver answers, his voice firm and almost mean.  He turns his gaze to his friend.  “When I first brought her into this, you had your doubts.  You were worried it would put her in danger and I said we could keep her safe.  And since then, she’s been threatened, kidnapped, shot, and today,” his voice gets louder, “today she almost suffocated in a metal box in the middle of nowhere!” 

Oliver takes a breath, reining his anger in somewhat.  “And all of that,” he continues, voice quieter, “is without the wrong people knowing how much she means to me.”

“So what are you going to do Oliver?”  Diggle retorts, challenging him.  “Stop loving her?”

Oliver’s heart lurches in his chest at the mere idea that he could stop loving Felicity.  But his feelings aren’t as important as her life.

“I have to keep her safe,” he says.  “Even if...” his eyes close, and he finds that he can’t bring himself to finish that sentence.

When Diggle replies, his tone is gentler than it was before.  “Don’t you think Felicity deserves some say in that?”

The sound of approaching footsteps make them both look up.  A women in blue scrubs is coming towards them.  Oliver stands up at the same time as the doctor asks “Mr Queen?”

“Yes,” he answers, anxiousness stirring in his stomach.  “How is she?”

“She’s resting.  Exposure to high levels of carbon dioxide often causes fatigue.  It may take a few days before she’s back to normal.”

“But she’ll be alright?”

“Yes, we think so.”

The relief that washes through Oliver is palpable.  The doctor gives him a kind smile.

“Can I see her?” he asks.

“Of course,” the doctor replies and gestures for them to follow her down the corridor. 

When they enter her room, Felicity is sleeping.  Her skin is too pale, and a purple bruise colours the side of her face, but Oliver still can’t help thinking she’s the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen.  He moves to the side of the bed and grabs her hand while Diggle takes the chair near the window.  The two men don’t say anything.  They just take up their places in the quiet hospital room, and listen to her breathe.

***

The first time Felicity came to, it felt like she was floating.  Stars and tree tops blinked in and out of existence and she thought there were voices, soothing and familiar voices.  It was cool and when a breeze hit her face, she gasped.  The air, it was so amazing, but she couldn’t quite remember why.

The second time Felicity came to, there were bright lights and hovering faces.  Something was covering her mouth.  She tried to reach up and take it off, but someone else’s hands stopped her.  Instinct kicked in and she tried to fight against them, but it was a losing battle.  Voices told her to be calm, someone stroked the top of her head.  Energy expended, she gave in.

This time when Felicity comes to, it’s quiet.  She feels calm and as the cobwebs start to clear from her brain, she remembers the cop, the Count, the box.  In a moment of panic, her eyes pop open and her body jerks, but what she sees relaxes her immediately.  Digg is standing at the foot of the bed, Roy is to her left, and Oliver is holding her hand.

"You’re ok,” she hears Oliver say, and every bit of tension she’s feeling washes away.  They found her, she thinks in wonder and awe.  Then she almost laughs at herself as she thinks _Of course they did.  They’re the best._

"How are you feeling?”  Digg asks her.

In a voice slightly raspier than her own she answers “Tired.  Sore.”  Then, as an afterthought, adds “I got punched in the face.”

She can see the hard set of Roy’s jaw when he tells her, “Don’t worry, so he did.”

“What do you remember?”  Oliver asks her gently.

“Most of it, I think.  The cop grabbed me, took me to Vertigo, then to that box...” She shudders at the memory, and she can see Oliver swallow.  “Then it’s just bits and pieces.”  She looks over at Diggle and has a flash of his face, hovering over hers, as she looked up at the stars.  She smiles a little then.  “But you found me,” she says.

“Yeah,” Digg replies, giving her a little smile in return.

“And the Count?” she asks.

"Taken care of,” Oliver tells her softly.

“Go team,” she says, trying to inject a bit of levity, but her words come out on a yawn.

Oliver strokes through her hair.  “Get some rest,” he tells her, and, with one last look to all of them, Felicity lets her eyes close.  But something in the tone of Oliver’s voice tickles at the back of her mind and, almost reflexively, makes her squeeze his hand tighter.

It’s only when his low voice answers, “I’m not going anywhere,” that Felicity lets herself fall back into sleep.

***

“Your vitals look good Miss Smoak,” the doctor tells her, removing the stethoscope from Felicity’s chest and putting it back around her own neck.  “I imagine we’ll get to sending you home soon.”

Felicity smiles at that.  Oliver is beside her, in the chair she knows he hasn’t left in the whole time she’s been here.  But despite his physically close proximity, he seems distant.  It worries her.

The doctor fills in a few notes on the chart, then bids them goodbye, leaving her and Oliver alone.  Felicity looks over to Oliver and gives him a wistful smile.  “I can’t wait until we’re at home, and you can crawl in bed with me,” she says.

It was a bit of an innuendo, an intentional one.  She thought it might get a smile out of him.  It doesn’t.  Instead, she sees sadness, resignation.  And suddenly, she understands.

"Don’t give me that look,” she tells him, her voice serious.

“What look?”

“I can see it in your face, Oliver, what you’re thinking, what you’re going to say, and I won’t let you.  I won’t let you destroy everything we have together.”

“Felicity...”

“No,” she says, and she’s adamant.  “There is no circumstance in the world that could make me believe it would be better if we weren’t together.  Not this, not anything.”

His jaw clenches and his hand squeezes hers, like every muscle in his body is tightening at the same time.  “You almost died, because of me, and I can’t...” his voice breaks, he swallows and tries again, “I can’t...”

She sits up, ignoring the pain of her bruised ribs, and reaches to cradle his face in her hands.  “Yes,” she tells him, “I thought I was going to die.  And do you know what was going through my head?  That it was worth it, that I wouldn’t trade my life with you for anything, that I didn’t have a single regret.”

His eyes are wet and he can’t look at her when he says, “I can’t be the reason you die.”

She brushes her thumbs over his cheeks.  “You’re the reason I’m alive,” she says softly.  “There’s always risk Oliver.  Maybe there’s more risk in our lives than others, but no one is completely protected from tragedy.  We can’t let that stop us from being happy.  Because with you, I’m happy.”  A smile breaks out on her face then, even as tears flow down her cheeks.  “I’m so incredibly happy.”

He reaches for her then, hugging her tightly against him, burying his face against her neck.  Her arms wrap around him in response and she holds him just as close.  His body shakes with emotion and she can feel his silent tears against her skin.  Then she feels his lips, so impossibly warm, as they press to every inch of skin he can reach.  And with every kiss, she hears his whispered “I love you”, a sound she knows she will carry with her until the end.

In the days and weeks that follow, she knows he still feels guilt at times, she can almost see it taking over his body.  One night, after he wakes frantically from a nightmare, he even yells at her to leave him, to get as far away as she can, to run and not look back.

She doesn’t.

Instead, she waits for him to calm down, wraps her arms around him and tells him _No_.  She tells him that she loves him and that being with him is her choice, that he will always be her choice, and she holds him while he cries.    

Someone is always there to pick her up from work, Oliver or Digg or Roy.  One day it’s even Lyla.

“They put you up to this too?” Felicity asks her.

Lyla gives a small smile and a shrug.  “They love you,” she tells her and Felicity, knowing it’s true, lets it go.

Gradually, things settle, go back to normal. Well, normal for them anyway.  But Felicity understands that this might not be the end of the battle.  That, in their line of work, it’s entirely possible she’ll face danger again and Oliver will once more be convinced that they’d be better off apart.  But she’s willing to fight for him, for them.  Because if there is one thing Felicity knows, it’s that she will love Oliver Queen until the day she dies.  A day that is, hopefully, far, far in the future. 

 


End file.
